No man would want a
girl that had had a scandal like that on her."

"I would," he said, "and I do. And it isn't a scandal."

Some one joined them and he had no chance to continue until the
following Sunday, when Heiligs and Brauners went together to the Bronx
for a half-holiday. They could not set out until their shops closed,
at half-past twelve, and they had to be back at five to reopen for the
Sunday supper customers. They lunched under the trees in the yard of a
German inn, and a merry party they were.

Hilda forgot to keep up her pretense that her healing wounds were not
healing and never would heal. She teased Otto and even flirted with
him. This elevated her father and his mother to hilarity. They were
two very sensible young-old people, with a keen sense of humor--the
experience of age added to the simplicity and gaiety of youth.

You would have paused to admire and envy had you passed that way and
looked in under the trees, as they clinked glasses and called one to
another and went off into gales of mirth over nothing at all. What
laughter is so gay as laughter at nothing at all? Any one must laugh
when there is something to laugh at; but to laugh just because one must
have an outlet for bubbling spirits there's the test of happiness!

After luncheon they wandered into the woods and soon Otto and Hilda
found themselves alone, seated by a little waterfall, which in a quiet,
sentimental voice suggested that low tones were the proper tones to use
in that place.

"We've known each other always, Hilda," said Otto. "And we know all
about each other. Why not--dear?"

She did not speak for several minutes.

"You know I haven't any heart to give you," she answered at last.

Otto did not know anything of the kind, but he knew she thought so, and
he was too intelligent to dispute, when time would settle the
question--and, he felt sure, would settle it right. So he reached out
and took her hand and said: "I'll risk that."

And they sat watching the waterfall and listening to it, and they were
happy in a serious, tranquil way. It filled him with awe to think that
he had at last won her. As for her, she was looking forward, without
illusions, without regrets, to a life of work and content beside this
strong, loyal, manly man who protested little, but never failed her or
any one else.

On the way home in the train she told her mother, and her mother told
her father. He, then and there, to the gre